Wednesday, June 13, 2012

When I saw a Super Mario Birthday party on one of the other party blogs out in the blogosphere, and realized my sister was having her 25th birthday soon, I knew I had to throw her a party. I was going to keep the theme a surprise. Then she suggested a mario theme. I fibbed, I told her that I had already started getting Luau stuff and it would be more summery and grown up than a Super Mario party.

I didnt do invitations because there wasnt time to get them out, so I just made a facebook event and called a few people.

She was very surprised it wasnt a Luau when she walked in. I had put pink flamingo decorations at the end of our driveway and on the door to the shop.

In the middle of the table were Piranha Plants, a green pipe and chocolate gold coins.

Power Flowers

The flower head is just cardstock and sharpie eyes. I decided to make it round instead of oblong because it was easier to find round items to trace than oblong. I found the plastic green pots with silk flowers in them at Dollar Tree. I pulled the flowers out of the styrofoam. I had flower stems/leaves leftover from the butterfly clips I made (and hadnt taken my craft room garbage out yet) so I taped the flower head to a stem and stuffed it into the styrofoam. This project took about 10 minutes

Boo Balloons

Boo was one of my pinata ideas, but decided to make balloons instead. I just blew up white balloons and drew the faces/arms on with sharpie. I thought of making arms out of white paper cones but wanted to get more things done so I saved a few minutes by just drawing arms on.

Chain Chomp

The Chain Chomp was another pinata idea. The only white balloons i found for the Boos were in a multi-pack with black ones so I made this guy pretty quickly. His face is just mailing lables cut up and sharpie for the eyes. The chain is a simple black paper chain made with card stock and staples. It was funny where he was hanging, he would often jump off and bite at people coming in the doors.

Star Balloons

at the dollar tree I saw these balloons and thought they would work great as Starmen, then at my nephew's graduation, I saw they used the same balloons in the decorations. My aunt is on the school board so I asked her to see if she could keep the balloons for me to reuse. I figured I could refill them if needed, graduation was Wednesday and the party was going to be on Sunday. They ended up not needing refilled so I got 6 helium filled star balloons for free. All I had to do was add the electrical tape eyes.

Backdrop

The blue is a baby blue plastic Dollar Tree table cloth. I found the cloud image here, edited it and printed them from home. They were cut out by my hubby. The coins were punched with a circle punch out of a gold gift bag. The stars were a gold star billboard boarder from the teacher section of Dollar tree, I used sharpie to make eyes and cut them apart.

I downloaded a free Super Mario Brothers font from here and made labels for the food items to tie in the theme.

Princess Peach Punch

The punch was 2 cartons of peach/orange/mango juice, a 2 liter of Sierra Mist, a packet of sugar free peach drink powder, and a bag of frozen peaches.

Super Mushroom Cakes

These are just box cake mixes with food coloring added. Red are strawberry and green are vanilla. I poked holes in the cupcakes with a straw and piped frosting in the holes. I topped the holes with upside-down white chocolate chips for the dots.

I used refridgerated sugar cookie dough, cut out circles and used a smaller circle cookie cutter as a stencil and sprayed on Wilton Color Mist inside the cutter, then baked. While still cooling, I poked candy corn into the cookies to look like Koopa's spikey shell. The colored part of the cookie crackled when it baked, which was unintentional but made the green look more like a shell.

Brick Brownies

I used a box mix and my brownie pan, which makes individual brownies in squares. I piped on the grout lines.

Starman Krispies Treats

These are just rice krispies treats cut into stars.

Lemon Candy Question Blocks

The recipe for these was on the back of the Chex Mix box, they're a white chocolate version of muddy buddies. I used lemon Jell-O instead of lemon zest.

Mario's Mustache Pops

I ordered the mold for these pops here. They were cheap so I bought 2 so it would be faster to make them.

I got pictures of most of the guests with mustaches.

Atomic Fireballs

Itsa Spaghetti anda Meata Ballsa

Power Up Pasta

(with turtle shells noodles)

Bowser Breath Bread

(garlic bread)

Although it was a grown-up's party I still wanted the kids to have some fun and goodies.

I found the pin the mustache on Mario free printable here. I edited it slightly to use less ink when printed at home.

The pinata was a Costco size cereal box covered in leftover brick corrugated cardboard from a fireplace design I made a Christmas. I had perferated the corners but it was still too strong, after all the kids got multiple turns, I tore the box and ended up just swinging the pinata across the floor to dump out the goodies.

I had felt sticky mustaches for everyone to wear.

Pipe decorations

I had thought to get actual pipes and paint them green but pipe connectors (to make the rim) were kinda spendy. Last minute, I found green can cozys at walmart. I cut them in half, some went on painted green soda cans and some went on crystal light drink mix canisters and a can of beets covered in paper.

Price breakdown

6 Green pipes

3 can cozies: $3 (Walmart)

leftover green paint: free

recycled drink cans: free

$0.50 each

8 Pirahna plants:

3 pack of terra cotta pots x 3= $3 (Dollar Tree)

8 pack of ping pong balls = $1 (Dollar Tree)

leftover red paint: Free (would be like $0.88 for a 2oz bottle)

leftover white paint: (would be like $0.88 for a 2oz bottle)

leftover green paint: (would be like $0.88 for a 2oz bottle)

Black paint: $0.88 (could have used sharpie)$4.88 = $0.61 each

Power Flowersplastic pots with flowers in them: $1 (Dollar Tree)cardstock from my stash: Free (would be like $0.49/sheet from craft store)garbage stems: free (maybe could have used the ones that came in the pot)

About Me

I'm a mother of 2 girls and a wife for going on 8 years. I have an Associate's Degree in Early Childhood Education but I intend on continuing my education and work in lactation. I am passionate about breastfeeding. I did an internship with WIC's lactation group, and I am one of the core members of the Marion County Breastfeeding Coalition. I am a peer counselor for the Nursing Mothers Council and I would also like to be a Le Leche Leader in the future. I love planning parties!
I use some FlyLady concepts (to try to) keep me on top of my housework routines and I highly recommend it.
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